


Across the Stars

by ancient_moonshine



Series: Across the Stars [1]
Category: Star Wars - All Media Types, 镇魂 | Guardian (TV), 镇魂 | Guardian - priest
Genre: Chosen One!Zhao Yun Lan, Jedi Master!Zhao Mom, Sith lord!Shen Wei, Smuggler!Ye Zun, Ye Zun POV
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2019-03-05
Updated: 2019-03-05
Packaged: 2019-11-12 09:02:41
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 2,033
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/18007913
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/ancient_moonshine/pseuds/ancient_moonshine
Summary: [Star Wars AU] Ye Zun is dragged back into the Rebellion he tried to outrun, fights the brother he'd fled from, and witnesses him have a moment with the Chosen One. It is not a good day.





	Across the Stars

**Author's Note:**

> I read that in the drama, the name on Zhaomom's gravestone is Shen Xi. No time to confirm for myself, but here you go.

Ye Zun is not having a good day.

He barely parries a blaster shot that would have taken his head off with his lightsaber, sending it back to the stormtrooper who shot at him. The stormtrooper crumples to the floor, and Ye Zun’s grateful for the slight incline leading up to the hangar as he manages to bowl the stormtrooper’s corpse straight at his advancing cohorts. He’s too harried and frantic to feel anything but slight satisfaction as he fucking _runs_ for it.

This was not how he expected this week to go. He’d been promised an easy job in Mos Espa, smuggling water into Tatooine under the less-than-dedicated border guards’ noses to avoid the water tariff. High pay for low risk, and Ye Zun’s one of the best smugglers out there but he’d take a boring run any day over one that would end with him locked up in an Imperial labor camp. Or worse.

He should have known it was too good to be true. He’d taken one look at his supposed customers – a worryingly familiar grizzled man with obviously military bearing and his beaming, fresh-faced son with an unnaturally bright Force signature – and realized he’d been thoroughly hoodwinked. Before he could excuse himself and make a break for it he’d felt the tip of a blaster against his back, looked up to find his old Jedi Master, her expression as serene and implacable as ever as her fucking _son_ blindfolded Ye Zun before bundling him off to the _fucking_ Rebellion’s hideout, which happened to be right in the moisture farm Xi-jie’s family runs.

Now, he’s in the last place he ever expected to be – an Imperial base swarming with stormtroopers, assigned to smuggle out a very wanted Princess slated for execution for stealing some plans about a superweapon _._ Ye Zun would very much like to dump them all and _run_ , but he knows well how ruthless Xi-jie is and doesn’t need to have _both_ Empire and Rebellion gunning for him. Ye Zun would curse the Force into getting him into this kind of predicament, but from bitter experience that’s just tempting it more, the fucking bitch.

 _Damn Xi-jie,_ Ye Zun thinks hysterically as he dodges another volley of blaster fire. _Damn Zhao Xinci, if that’s even his real name. Damn your son. Damn the Rebellion, and your Princess, and fucking all of you-_ Then he catches sight of his beloved _Falcon_ which must be currently being piloted by Xi-jie’s son _–_ and if that brat crashes his baby Ye Zun’s selling him to slavers, his terror of Xi-jie be damned.

 Ye Zun foolishly lets himself feel a little relief as the _Falcon_ lands in the hangar bay without incident – save for the blaster cannons aimed its way, but that was expected – and then he feels his skin prickle, and dread sinks heavy into his stomach as he senses the very person he’d never wanted to run into, ever again.

The Emperor is shrouded in black robes and wears a mask. Ye Zun knows this before he turns to face him. He’s seen his image in enough Imperial propaganda, none of them showing his true face. And isn’t this just every holodrama cliché, ever, as his cloak billows out when he advances on Ye Zun.

He must’ve come here to personally interrogate the Princess, but Ye Zun doesn’t let himself think about that, or about anything. He pulls out his lightsaber and takes a swing.

Ye Zun feels a cruel twist of pride that the Emperor barely manages to duck and block his strike with his. And then they’re going to town on each other, twenty years’ worth of pent-up rage and hurt bursting out of him like magma through a volcanic vent, and he doesn’t notice the Emperor feinting before he tries to aim for an opening by his side and winds up flat on his back, his lightsaber knocked out of his hand.

Ye Zun stares at the Emperor, his heart pounding. Ignoring dignity in favour of scrabbling back away and clinging to the last few moments of life he has left. His back hits durasteel, and Ye Zun knows he’s doomed.

All of a sudden, all he wants is this to be over and done with. “Take off your fucking mask.” Ye Zun finds himself spitting out. The Emperor actually gives pause at that. “I want to see your goddamn face when you kill me.” Ye Zun can’t see his eyes through that stupid mask, but to his surprise the Emperor obeys. And as he slips it off and his hood down, Ye Zun sees the face that’s haunted his nightmares and memories for twenty years, unchanged from when he last saw it as he fled from Mustafar.

“Gege,” Ye Zun finds himself saying, his voice breaking. Painfully familiar gold eyes stare at him – so different from the night-black ones that Ye Zun always tries to avoid looking at in the mirror, and there’s something there, some emotion that Shen Wei’s trying to control but failing to. But before Ye Zun can identify it, the _fucking farmboy_ is here-Ye Zun hadn’t even noticed him leaving the ship, the fuck –charging into their duel with his mother’s spare lightsaber like he has a snowball’s chance in Tatooine The Emperor moves to disarm him with barely a glance – and then he freezes.

Ye Zun would have chalked it up to sheer incredulous disbelief at the farmboy’s idiocy, but Zhao Yunlan is looking at his twin with the same intently fascinated and oddly elated expression he’s been watching Ye Zun with since they met, that had nearly made Ye Zun snap why he found his face so interesting, but Xi-jie had always herded her son away from him before he could.

“It’s you.” He breathes, extinguishing his lightsaber and actually _pocketing_ it. Ye Zun only bites back his shriek of aggravation when he sees the look on Shen Wei’s face. Amazement, disbelief, longing, all rolled into one. Ye Zun stares from the farm brat, to Shen Wei, and back again.

_What. The fuck. Is going on._

“You’re real?” Shen Wei whispers, and Zhao Yunlan swallows. Ye Zun can see the nervous bob of his throat, like he’s asking the Emperor to dance at the Festival of Rain instead of _trying to get out of being chopped into mincemeat by a Sith lord, oh stars._ He takes a step forwards, and Ye Zun can’t help his hand closing over the back of his white tunic, trying to yank him back. But the boy is undeterred. 

“Yeah.” Zhao Yunlan says, his voice actually _cracking._ “I am. And _you’re_ even more beautiful in real life.” and there he is, actually _touching the Emperor’s cheek_ like the suicidally besotted idiot he apparently is, his expression nothing short of worshipful. Ye Zun semi-hysterically wonders if that means the brat’s attracted to him too, considering well, _he and Shen Wei are identical twins-_ also why the hell Shen Wei isn’t chopping the brat’s hand off yet. But then again up until this point Ye Zun’s life has been a bad holodrama, so why the fuck not.

“I’ve been waiting to meet you for so long.” Zhao Yunlan says. Shen Wei takes a breath, like he’s searching for a reply but can’t find one. _Why the fuck not, indeed._ The look on his twin’s face tells Ye Zun he’s good and distracted. He takes his chance.

His lightsaber spins back into his hand, and he leaps, intent on taking Shen Wei’s head off his shoulders, but the brat turns, actually blocks his blow with shocking speed.  Shoving Shen Wei behind him like it’s the fucking Sith lord’s the one who needs protecting. Shen Wei’s gaze is as shocked as Ye Zun feels.

“Don’t.” The brat says fiercely, his eyes blazing, and Ye Zun is reminded so strongly of Xi-jie that it feels like a punch to the gut. “I’m not gonna let you kill each other.” Ye Zun grits his teeth.

“If you have any common sense, brat, you’ll fucking _get out of here_ and let me save all our lives.” Zhao Yunlan looks like he wants to say something, and then they hear shouts. Ye Zun chances a glance at the _Falcon,_ sees Zhao Xinci, Xi-jie, and a girl in a diaphanous red gown and the most ridiculous side-buns emptying their blasters into a platoon of stormtroopers.

 _“Master Ye Zun_ _!”_ Lin J-7’s staticky voice crackles over the station’s loudspeaker. “Sorry for the bother, but we really gotta go now, they’re closing in on us-“ He’s interrupted by DQ-3q’s frantic binary chirrups. Ye Zun swears, and Zhao Xinci looks up, sees their little diorama. Ye Zun holding his lightsaber, his own son blocking him from putting down the Emperor.

Zhao Yunlan sees him too. He turns to face Shen Wei.

“If you let them go, I’ll stay.” He says, Shen Wei’s eyes widen just as Ye Zun’s mouth drops open. Zhao Yunlan continues speaking, and as he glances at Ye Zun he actually has the audacity to give him a _wink._

“I’m the Chosen One.” He says, and oh _goddamit Xi-jie how did you raise this idiot._ “The one the Jedi prophesied would bring balance to the Force, the singular biggest threat to the Empire’s rule. You’ve been hunting for me ever since I was born. I’ve been wanting to meet you my whole life.” He nods at the party by the _Falcon._ “Seems a fair trade, to let the rebels go.”

“You overestimate your importance.” Shen Wei says after a long, incredulous silence. Zhao Yunlan gives him a wry grin. Touches Shen Wei’s face again, and really if Shen Wei takes his arm off by the elbow he won’t be able to blame his _gege_ one bit.

“I know I’ve been dreaming about you since before I could even talk.” Zhao Yunlan says softly. Like he’s talking to his lover instead of the most powerful Sith lord in the galaxy. “I’m not about to leave you behind.” And Ye Zun snaps out of it.

He brutally shoves Zhao Yunlan right into Shen Wei’s arms with the Force, nearly knocking the both of them over, Shen Wei barely managing to extinguish his lightsaber before almost eviscerating Zhao Yunlan with it and catching his new hostage in his arms. Ye Zun darts away like the coward he is, scrabbling to the _Falcon_ like a frightened lothcat. He yanks Zhao Xinci back into the ship with him when he tries to charge, binding him none-too-gently with the Force when he tries to muscle his way out before the hatch closes, then snaps at Lin J-7 to start the ascent.

" _Not_ a master." He snarls a correction at the protocol droid, who stammers through an apology. He barely spares the still-struggling Zhao Xinci a glance, hands flying over the _Falacon's_ controls. 

“Spare yourself the dismemberment. Your son won’t be leaving with us.” He says tersely. Zhao Xinci curses him out but Xi-jie stops him. Her face white and strained but no surprise in her expression at all as she watches the shape of her son growing smaller by the parsec.Zhao Yunlan watches the _Falcon_ take flight. The last time Ye Zun sees them before they go into hyperdrive has him standing close to Shen Wei, an arm around his waist, clinging to the hand holding the lightsaber.

Ye Zun doesn’t look at his twin as he runs away from him for the second time. He can feel Shen Wei's eyes on him, anyway.

The girl in red – Princess Zhu Hong - is barking a coded message into DQ-3q’s intercom. A reply cackles out, but Ye Zun’s too exhausted to care about what it is. Xi-jie sits by the porthole, watching the stars streak past, holding onto her husband’s hand. Ye Zun glances at her, then looks away just as fast.

“The Resistance base is on Yavin IV.” Princess Zhu Hong says. Ye Zun sighs. Contemplates twenty years of running, only to end up precisely where he tried to escape. For a moment, he longingly thinks of ejecting everyone into the cold vacuum of space before he resignedly punches Yavin IV’s coordinates in.

**Author's Note:**

> Comments are appreciated. :flops over: Exam week stress is making my brain work on everything I'm not supposed to be doing.


End file.
